I’ve been planning a trip to Hawaii for almost 9 months. Once Sharon and I hammered out our dates for the trip, I went through my usual process. Start with the most challenging thing first and work from there.
That usually means starting with the flights. I was able to find award flights to/from Hawaii on Delta and Hawaiian. I then booked our inter-island flight on Southwest.
The next thing was finding places to stay. We’re breaking up our time on Kauai between two locations. The last part of the trip we’re going to Oahu. Plan A was to use our Disney Vacation Club points to stay at Aulani at Ko Olina. However, by the time I was looking, all the availability was gone for our dates. I went to Plan B and looked for a Marriott property in Honolulu.
We spent plenty of time looking at the various options considering the points we’d have to redeem to book the stay, the likelihood we’d be able to get an upgrade using our Platinum Suite Night Upgrades, and additional expenses including resort charges and parking fees.
I finally decided on a hotel, booked a base level room with points and applied our upgrade knowing we wouldn’t know until 5 nights before the stay if we’d get a better room. I was planning on asking for a paid upgrade if our certificates didn’t clear.
The trip is almost here so on a whim I checked to see if there were any available rooms at Aulani. One downside of putting a room on the waitlist with Disney as you have to pick a specific room type. While my choice was still booked, there was a different room view available.
I felt a moment of hesitation. I know this was my Plan A, but I convinced myself that I was OK with Plan B over time. The option that I spent hours researching, comparing options and finally picking the best one. In my mind, I convinced myself that this was the best choice. In a second, I would throw that all away and go somewhere else.
I went to Sharon and asked her what she wanted. She turned back to me and asked why I’d like to stay at Aulani instead of the hotel we booked. I effortlessly named five advantages over the second option. She gave me the “You know what to do” look, but I wanted her OK before ditching our plans for other ones.
Here’s the trap. When you book trips using points and miles, your number one choice may not be available when you’re planning the trip. Airlines might not release space in first class until a few days before the trip. Hotels can mess with availability to limit award bookings only to release space later. If you spend hours making other plans, it isn’t easy to throw all of that away and go with your first choice.
Learn to deal with it. You’re going to spend time researching flights or hotels that you’ll never see. Take it as a learning experience. Be happy that you could make a trip happen when you were faced with limited award space. The fact that you can upgrade your trip should make you happy, not sad.
We’ve all been there. Part of the fun of this game is the search. Enjoy your growth beyond looking for easy redemptions. You may need to use that knowledge for a future trip. Always be prepared to ditch your plans if you find something better.
Want to comment on this post? Great! Read this first to help ensure it gets approved.
Want to sponsor a post, write something for Your Mileage May Vary or put ads on our site? Click here for more info.
Like this post? Please share it! We have plenty more just like it and would love it if you decided to hang around and sign up to get emailed notifications of when we post.
Whether you’ve read our articles before or this is the first time you’re stopping by, we’re really glad you’re here and hope you come back to visit again!
This post first appeared on Your Mileage May Vary
Join our mailing list to receive the latest news and updates from our team.